“Why Should We Care?”: Motivations of Public Librarians in the American South to Expand Civic Engagement for Racial Justice

Abstract

An important aspect of human information behavior research is to understand the motivations of people as they interact with information and technologies to make a difference. This paper presents exploratory findings of a qualitative study of public librarians' motivations to expand civic engagement for racial justice in the American South. The geographical region is stereotypically characterized historically as being solely racially intolerant in public perceptions, scholarly discourse, political networks, and news media. This research challenges such limited notions, highlighting public librarian's logic‐based motivations to further civic engagement for racial justice in context of the nation's historical/contemporary racialized political climate. In the process, the authors acknowledge the voices/perspectives of public librarians, an often‐underrepresented group in privileged academic information behavior research. Thematic narrative analysis is explored as a strategic mode of presenting the findings.